ROBERT PIERCE
• Leader & Times
As discussion continued at Monday’s public hearing for the Fiscal Year 2026 budget, more constituents sounded off, as did Seward County staff and commissioners.
Much of the talk around the Conestoga Energy case in which the company appealed its appraisal to the Board of Tax Appeals concerned the accruing interest on a potential payback currently sitting at nearly $6 million being asked for at this time.
Administrator April Warden said that number is set by Kansas statute and is subject to change, but it currently sits at 8.25 percent based on BOTA’s most recent ruling.
Warden said county leaders did not opt for the worst case scenario of a 29 mill increase over the Revenue Neutral Rate stated in letters to property owners this year, but rather, they wanted to have enough money to pay back the three years being looked at in district court in Sedgwick County at this time and the interest that would come with it.
Local resident Justin Alexander asked if it was necessary to increase the mill levy by 13.384, as was narrowly approved later in the meeting, in one year to cover a debt that could still not be known until two years from now. He also asked if county leaders could negotiate a payment plan with Conestoga.
“Let us pay back half a million dollars a year for X amount of years until we get this settled, or we work with them in their tax situation to do something like that,” he said.
Commissioner Presephoni Fuller, one of three commissioners who voted in favor of the increase, said predicting with unknowns in place is hard to do, but she said being prepared is better than not being prepared.
“It’s like insurance,” she said. “It’s better to have it and not need it than to need it and not have it. We’re setting ourselves up that if it goes in favor of Seward County, there is some negotiation there for our taxpayers, but we have to prepare for the worst. We are setting ourselves up not for failure, but to take care of this responsibility over the next three years.”
Commission Chair Scott Carr and Commissioner Tammy Sutherland-Abbott joined Fuller to vote for the increase, and when they came on board the commission in 2024, they decided to begin putting aside money to help pay back Conestoga.
With more than $1 million now set aside for the case, Alexander questioned the need for an increase of the level that was passed Monday.
“Why not cut that down to four or seven?” he said. “You’re still putting more money away plus your half a million dollars in preparing for the next one.”
Like other constituents, Alexander asked about the effect the decision would have for new business in the county.
“What is the draw for those people to come in and bring employees in when our mills are increases and our taxes are increasing?” he said. “What’s the realistic hope of that actually happening? What is the draw for them?”
Fuller said multiple businesses are coming to the county, and what is attracting to them is the increase in the local housing market.
“Three or four years ago, we only had six houses for sale,” she said. “That’s no longer the case. We have a company that’s coming I’m not privy to mention. They’re bringing some jobs here, and there’s housing here to house those families. Those entities are starting to come.”
Fuller said the lack of certain businesses in Liberal is leading many elsewhere to do their shopping.
“Over the weekend, there’s a mass exodus out of Liberal,” she said. “They’re going to Dodge City. They’re going to Garden City. They’re going to Amarillo. They’re going to Guymon. They’re going to other places. Why? Because we don’t have what they’re looking for. We have to be a little smarter about businesses we do bring here. All those tax dollars are going out, and that’s something we need to look at, but that housing question has been solved for us.”
Fuller said a major manufacturer could be coming to Seward County with at least 30 and the potential of 100 more employees, and this would provide a boost for the local tax base.
Commissioner Todd Stanton, who voted against the increase, said Alexander was simply saying businesses will likely look at Seward County less favorably after the increase.
Alexander said with neighboring states just a few miles away, those states could be chosen over Kansas as well.
“For the person who’s moving here to work as close as we are to Oklahoma, what’s the drive for them to stay in Seward County when the typical home increased $1,200 to $1,500 in taxes in one year?” he said.
Fuller said it is unknown what will happen with the county in the future.
“We don’t know what it’s going to be next year,” she said. “It may be more. It may be less. We don’t know. We do know it cannot stay the same. It cannot stay flat.”
Local resident Carolyn Huddleston said while commissioners believe the increase is necessary, she does not.
“The issue Conestoga Energy Partners has alleged is the appraisal of their ethanol plant included the value of machinery and equipment that should have been tax exempt,” she said.
Huddleston said the lawsuit listed several items, and with law in place since 2007 to exempt machinery and equipment from being taxed, fewer mistakes should have been made with the appraisal.
“I think the Board of Tax Appeals came out with a decision we owe $1.2 million and not $5.9 million because there were not that many mistakes that were made,” she said.
Should a decision come down from district court more in favor of Seward County, Huddleston said Conestoga is likely to appeal again to get more money.
“There’s a good chance this case is going to stay in litigation no matter what decision the judge makes,” she said. “At this point, I don’t know if Conestoga would accept the $1.2 million, but if they did, the interest on that $1.2 million for these three years is about $700,000.”
Huddleston said the payback should also be less because Conestoga has been paying taxes at the same level as the lawsuit continues.
“It’s possible they’ve been doing so up to the present time since it was appealed and there hasn’t even been a final ruling yet,” she said.
Many constituents were concerned about what they felt was a high level of benefits being paid to county employees. Huddleston said numbers from Barton County and Ford County, both with larger populations than Seward County, show those counties are paying less for benefits.
“For the Seward County amount budgeted, they asked us to pay in $5,675,000 for employee benefits,” she said. “For Barton County, their request was $3,774,525. They are a larger county than us with a population of 24,835, yet they asked almost $2 million less in employee benefits. For Ford County, 34,000 people, and they asked their total employee benefits of $4,822,000. They’re 6 percent higher in employees. They have to pay every bit of that out. It looks like their employee benefit cost total is very close to Seward County, but when you look at insurance alone, their insurance bill is a million less than ours.”
Huddleston said $2.5 million had not been spent in employee benefits in a previous year, and from 2018 to 2024, an estimated $8 million was not spent in benefits, all paid for with taxpayer money.
Warden said the county’s benefits package covers the Kansas Police and Fireman’s retirement system, the Kansas Public Employee Retirement System and health and dental insurance, as well as FICA and all payroll taxes.
“Everything is in our employee benefits fund,” she said. “With Barton County, they do not offer KP&F, and not every county offers KP&F. They offer KPERS, but they may not offer KP&F. KP&F makes a big difference in the amount the county has to pay on behalf of our law enforcement and fire.”
Warden emphasized the county is partially self-funded and is responsible for the first $125,000 in medical expenses for all employees covered by insurance.
“When we have money left over, it does roll into the general fund, and that helps offset the budget for the following year,” she said. “Understand that goes into rollover, and that’s considered when we go to balance the budget the following year.”
Still, Huddleston said the money did not go to reducing what taxpayers pay for employee benefits.
“These other counties, theirs is way less, and they include the KPERS,” she said.
Warden, though, said different entities budget in different ways.
“We budget worst case scenario in employee benefits,” she said. “We do not have reserves set aside. We don’t have a different fund for reserves for benefit costs. If we had a bad health year, we base that information off what Blue Cross and Blue Shield comes to us and says is what they feel based on past years your claims are going to be.”
Huddleston said a worst case scenario has not happened in the years she researched.
“They used all the money, but instead of it sitting in that fund to then subtract wheat they asked us to pay in for employee benefits, it gets kicked out into the general fund, and then we bill the same amount,” she said.
Property taxes too were a large part of the discussion Monday. Huddleston said she had a property tax of less than $900 in 1997, and that number increased to $3,084 in 2024.
“If you calculate what the increase should be by inflation, this is 260 percent, two and a half times more than what you would expect from inflation,” she said. “That’s the track record of the commission for the last 27 years. The amount of money they would actually need to cover what they had last year and an amount for inflation is $11,849,318.”
Commission Vice Chairman Steve Helm, who joined Stanton in voting against the increase, said it is not just the county being considered in the budget.
“There’s other taxing entities that are figured in the mill levy – the college, USD 480 and the city – so I understand,” he said. “We’re not out there on an island by ourselves raising the mill.”
